The Best Will Be Better Tomorrow
How industries that challenge their own success redefine the future
Too long, didn’t read:
What’s great today won’t be “good enough” next year. An essential feature of durable leadership is continuous improvement.
From Microsoft’s reinvention to Steph Curry’s shot-tracking to Kansas farmers managing water together, the results demonstrate the power of innovating from a position of leadership.
The next generation of ag leaders will move beyond today’s standards, embracing new methods including precision technology and the discipline to prove it’s working.
We’re excited to share that this edition was written in collaboration with Dan Northrup, Principal, Science and Technology, Galvanize.
Is “good enough” holding us back?
“Good enough.” It’s the phrase we use when we’re tired, when resources are thin, when we just want to move on to the next thing. It gets the job done, at least for today. But history shows us something uncomfortable: “good enough” today won’t be good enough tomorrow. In the moment, it feels practical. In hindsight, it’s the first symptom of decline.
Agriculture cannot afford to rest on its laurels. The industry has a proud record of innovation and efficiency gains, but past progress is no guarantee of future resilience. If anything, history shows that when agriculture settles for “good enough,” it risks being overtaken by new challenges faster than it can adapt. Consider water: if we continue relying on the same pumping practices that built prosperity in the twentieth century, we risk draining away the foundation of tomorrow. Aquifers like the Ogallala are already showing the strain. What once seemed like “good enough” resource management now carries the very real possibility of leaving farms, towns, and entire regions without the water they need to survive. The stakes are too high to assume the old playbook will keep working.
Reinvention over obsolescence
The first lesson comes from technology, where many companies have faced “good enough” traps, while others use market pressure to pivot and become more successful than ever. For decades, Microsoft’s boxed Office products and enterprise software licenses dominated the market with billions in annual revenue and monopolistic market share. If any company had earned the right to rest on “good enough,” it was Microsoft in the early 2000s.
But when Amazon Web Services (AWS) emerged, the ground shifted for Microsoft. AWS proved that computing could move to the cloud and deliver speed, cost savings, and virtually unlimited scalability. Companies no longer had to build and maintain their own data centers. Instead, they could share massive infrastructure with thousands of others and pay only for what they used. Workloads could shift seamlessly across servers and regions, outages could be absorbed without shutting businesses down, and scaling up no longer required years of capital investment. The old model of boxed software tied to on-premise hardware began to look fragile, while the cloud opened the door to an entirely new revenue stream.
Microsoft responded by reinventing itself with Azure, Office 365, and a subscription-based model that emphasized continuous innovation. Moving into cloud infrastructure not only preserved its role as a leader in software and productivity but also created a powerful new growth engine. The company gained another advantage as well. Many retailers and competitors prefer not to run their systems on Amazon-owned infrastructure, giving Microsoft an opening that Azure has been able to fill. Microsoft’s pivot reminds us that even market leaders can’t assume dominance will last.
Redefining the geometry of success
Sports offers a second lens where the best got better: Steph Curry’s refusal to accept “good enough” redefined the geometry of basketball. Curry was already one of the best shooters in the league. Most players looked at the three-point line as the limit of their range, Curry treated it as a suggestion. By going further, he forced the entire sport to recalibrate. Defenders had to extend their range six or even ten feet farther. That change reshaped spacing, ball movement, and offensive philosophy across the league. The ripple effects were enormous: teams redesigned rosters around long-range shooting, defensive schemes stretched and fractured, and analytics departments rewrote their models for efficiency.
Curry used every tool he could to maximize his ability. He added shot-tracking technology to measure entry angle, arc, and depth. Just making shots wasn’t enough. Some makes are better than others, and Curry got better in practice to add tolerance under pressure. His relentless pursuit of excellence made his past successes the raw material for improvement.
Curry’s influence went far beyond the court. He changed how kids practice in driveways, how coaches design youth leagues, how front offices draft and trade, and even how broadcasters tell the story of a game. The true measure of his legacy is in how completely he rewired the expectations of an entire sport.
A new model for shared water
You’ve heard us sing the praises of Kansas’s Local Enhanced Management Areas before, but let us serenade you again. Kansas farmers in Groundwater Management District 4 faced a stark reality: the Ogallala Aquifer was declining faster than it could recharge. For decades, “good enough” meant pumping what was needed to meet annual production goals without a thought of aquifer health. But the reality caught up with this approach. Without change, wells would run dry and with them the economic base of western Kansas.
Instead of waiting for top-down regulation, they built something new: the state’s first Local Enhanced Management Area (LEMA). This framework allowed producers themselves to set voluntary limits on pumping, tailored to local hydrology and cropping systems. It was not a symbolic gesture. Farmers accepted reductions in water use, betting that smarter allocation could stretch the aquifer’s life without sacrificing their livelihoods. The gamble paid off: water use fell, aquifer declines slowed, yields remained stable, and, most importantly, incomes went up. Producers discovered that “using less” doesn’t equal “producing less.”
The map below shows just how uneven the Ogallala’s decline has been across western Kansas. In some areas, the aquifer has lost more than half its saturated thickness since irrigation began, while other pockets remain relatively stable. That patchwork of red and blue underscores why one-size-fits-all regulation won’t work. Local Enhanced Management Areas succeed precisely because they adapt to these differences.
The LEMA model is a proof of concept. It shows that agriculture can manage shared resources before a crisis forces it. It demonstrates that communities can innovate collectively, and in doing so, preserve both their land and their future. Most of all, it reminds us that “good enough” water practices, the kind that once fueled growth, won’t sustain it. Progress comes not from defending the past, but from redefining what responsible stewardship looks like in the present.
When margins are hard to find, ag needs all the help it can get
For decades, agriculture has been on the cusp of breakthrough after breakthrough. Precision agriculture, artificial intelligence, computer vision, and fungicides are all within reach. Each of these tools promises to move us beyond efficiency into true resilience. Yet too often, we’ve treated them as optional add-ons instead of necessities.
Fertilizer is a perfect example of this tension. Higher yields require higher inputs. It’s a simple reality that most critics of agriculture overlook. The obligation is to use it better. Every pound applied is both a cost and a responsibility. Misapplied, it drains value: lost nutrients, wasted dollars, and environmental consequences that critics seize on. Applied with precision, it is one of the sharpest tools farmers have to protect both their bottom line and their reputation. Stewardship and profitability rise together, and when agriculture invests in better use of fertilizer, it takes the higher ground in answering its critics.
Take precision agriculture. Variable-rate technology, GPS-guided planters, and real-time soil monitoring allow farmers to apply nutrients and water exactly where they are needed. The potential is to maximize yields while cutting waste and reducing environmental impact. But the adoption curve has flattened. Too many operations still treat precision tools as bells and whistles rather than standard practice.
Artificial intelligence offers another leap forward. Algorithms can already aggregate agronomic research, digest complex data sets, and deliver field-specific recommendations faster than any extension bulletin or seed guide. This could collapse the time lag between discovery and practice, shrinking decades of research translation into a single season. Yet in many cases, AI is used to fine-tune existing decisions rather than to rethink the system itself. Or, it isn’t being used at all.
The same pattern holds in computer vision and automation. We now have implements that can scan for weeds in real time and deliver micro-doses of herbicide only where needed, slashing chemical use and fuel consumption. This should be a watershed moment, transforming input economics and environmental outcomes in one sweep. But instead of embracing it as the new baseline, much of the industry still leans on traditional broadcast spraying. Certainly, there are cost considerations. Adding technology to this farm economy is difficult, and low farm profitability has ripple effects that affect everyone in the industry including seed and input providers. But is the upside worth figuring the economic piece out? History seems to imply that it is, particularly when you look at progress and technology adoption in other geographies, particularly South America.
Just like Steph Curry needed more than a high shooting percentage to redefine basketball, farmers need more than yield monitors to prove they’re improving. Curry broke down his shot with tools that tracked details that separated the good from the great. Agriculture has the same opportunity. Precision tools let farmers study their fields in greater depth and capture progress even when weather muddies the scoreboard. Deeper metrics like nutrient-use efficiency, water-use efficiency, and soil moisture retention paint a fuller picture of progress. Growing sophistication with on-farm testing has the potential to create shot trackers for production ag. Farmers gathering data can demonstrate improvements and provide key points to counter critics who are often using old or inaccurate arguments.
These technologies show what agriculture could do. They offer a future where profitability and sustainability are not at odds but mutually reinforcing. The danger is not that the tools don’t exist. The danger is that we stop short, congratulating ourselves on incremental progress while the real transformation remains unfinished. That is what “good enough” looks like in agriculture today—not failure, but the refusal to pursue the full measure of what’s possible.
From good enough to greatness
The lesson across all these examples is the same: “good enough” is rarely good for long. Kansas farmers proved that voluntary restraint is stronger than complacency. Microsoft proved that reinvention is critical to relevance, even for current market leaders. Curry proved that even the best can get better.
The uncomfortable but liberating truth is that your standing as the best is only as good as the next thing that comes along. And that’s not bad news. It’s an invitation to set a higher bar.
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About Serō Ag Strategies
At Serō Ag Strategies, we bridge farmers and supply chain partners by transforming complex agricultural data and policy into actionable insights. We also work to create and grow markets for commodity crops by aligning production with evolving demand, policy shifts, and sustainability goals. Combining multinational expertise with the personal touch of boutique consulting, we specialize in economic and sustainability analysis that drives strategic innovation.
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